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[Guide] Udyr: The Stance Dancer

After consistantly playing Udyr for 300+ games here is the playstyle I have had great success with. First of all you need to know that Udyr is very gear dependant. That means until he is fed or has farmed enough gold you will be relatively weak and unable to gank people solo. However, with the proper items you will be almost unstoppable 1v1 and a perfect assist / lane pushing character.

Skills:

Tiger Stance: (mana cost: 75/65/55/45/35) Activation: On his next attack, Udyr swipes at his target, dealing 1.8/2.1/2.4/2.7/3 times his attack damage over 2 seconds.
Persistent Effect: Udyr's attack speed is increased by 30/40/50/60/70%. In addition, Udyr splits his attacks into 3 lightning fast hits. On hit effects only trigger off the first hit.

Bear Stance:(mana cost: 75/65/55/45/35) Activation: Udyr gains 15/18/21/24/27% increased movement speed for 2/2.5/3/3.5/4 seconds. Persistent Effect: Udyr mauls his target with such force that they are stunned for 1 second. This effect cannot occur on the same target for 6 seconds.

Pheonix Stance: (mana cost: 75/65/55/45/35) Activation: Udyr sends out pulsing waves of fire dealing 15/25/35 (+0.25) magic damage each second to nearby enemies for 5 seconds. In addition, Udyr's ability power is increased by 16/24/32/38/44 and his attack damage is increased by half of that amount. Persistent Effect: Every fourth attack, Udyr engulfs enemies in front of him in flame, dealing 40/80/120/160/200(+0.25) magic damage.

How to use these abilities / stance dance:
When laning / jungling: constantly switch between Turtle and Pheonix
When ganking offensively: constantly switch between Bear and Pheonix
When fleeing heroes / being defensive: constantly switch between Turtle and Bear
When killing towers: constantly switch between Tiger and Pheonix

The more u switch stances, the more u stack Udyr's Passive. This is the key to getting kills and mitigating damage because u will stack atk speed and dodge also increasing the rate at which u leech life with Turtle and the rate at which your Pheonix procs.

1.) Ghost I highly suggest getting ghost. While you do have the movement speed bonus from switching to bear stance to flee or chase, sometimes it isnt enough and you will need the extra help. Ghost is key for ganking with your teammates as your role will most likely be a finisher and initiator in large battles.

2.) Exhaust / Smite If your gonna jungle in 5s or go for immediate red on 3s, get smite. Smite is very useful for 5s and 3s to collect red, blue, white, and greens buffs which can greatly increase your early game kills. Otherwise get exhaust in all other situations. Exhaust guarantees that after your bear stun, u can slow an opponent and get a kill almost every time.

With this item build you will be stacking atk speed items. The reason behind this is to proc as often as you can with your Pheonix Stance aoe damage. This proc will be the bread and butter of your damage in both 1v1 and team battle situations as well as your money maker while laning. The proc effect from sheen/trinity is amazing with this character because u will find yourself changing stances at least every 3 seconds, thus maximizing your damage.

You can build your skills any which way suits your playstyle best which is nice. But one thing to remember is you want to prioritize maxing out Pheonix Stance first no matter which route u take. I recommend picking up 3 points in turtle and then leaving it until you max out Pheonix / Bear, just so you can keep yourself alive in the early game but also dont lack on your offensive abilities for the mid game fights. If your doing it right life drain from Starks will cover most of your hp and u wont have to go turtle that often.

After those skills are maxed, get rank 3 Tiger Stance for tower killing / finishing blows.

How to play:

Early Game: Count your hits with phoenix stance timing it as often as possible to get procs off when their heroes are in range to be hit with it. This will add some help to your hero harassing ability. Once you've got your first two items u should be right around lvl 6, at which point your pheonix will have enough damage to successfully kill someone with less then 70%~ hp with help from another hero. Charge in at a good time with bear stance, switch to Pheonix until you proc at least once, then turtle, back to Bear (The idea behind switching to turtle after the Pheonix proc is to give u some extra hp for the chase and to keep your Monkey Agility buff stacked) rinse and repeat.

Mid Game: By the time you complete Trinity Force you will be a very deadly force, try to team up a good hero and coordinate stuns with their root / stun / or slowing abilities and you will almost always successfully kill someone. Make sure to get Golem buff and Lizard buff as much as possible as they are easy to solo past lvl 6 and will greatly increase your dps via stance switching.

Late Game: This is also a good time to look for heroes who might still be lower level and are trying to solo a lane to catch up / farm money. Once you have completed your Sunfire Cape / Banshee's Veil you will be close to impossible for most chars to take 1v1. It is important to remember that when u want to attack, a quick switch from turtle, to bear, to pheonix will stack your attack speed / burst capabilities much higher. That allows you to get off more pheonix procs at a quicker rate an increases your chance at a kill. Also, making a quick switch to Tiger Stance when an enemy is less that 25% hp is sometimes very helpful. It gives u a big burst of damage (2 x AD at lvl 3) plus increases your chances of getting a killing blow because each hit is spread into 3 sources of damage per hit. Worth a try.

This should give you a good place to start. Playing defensive is the key to playing this char well and you will need to figure out when you can turn on the aggression and chase using your bear sprint / stun or when you should switch between Turtle / Bear to run away. Good luck and happy hunting, feel free to leave any suggestions/ideas you might have here as well and I will test them out.

Twisted Treeline:

I will continue to update this as I play more games and get ideas/suggestions from other people. (Updated 6/1, changed a few items and changed masteries / runes. Spells now updated. Adding a TT Play Guide Soon)

As much as I love the concept he's completely ****ing terrible at the moment

Haha I agree he could use some tweaking to put him on par with some of the other more powerful characters. Maybe something like making his stun last 2 seconds instead of only 1 and adding a snare component to his tiger stance to make it more viable. I dunno just a thought

I agree, Udyr is much more of a late gamer and starts to shine mid game. However I usually get Phage first with my build with the health gem to start off with so he won't be too squishy. I usually try to max out Phoenix and turtle and with 1 point in bear by level 5. I don't agree on the Warmog/Guardian angel though.

IMO Soul shroud might be better although I am debating these items for him